We are..

Learing to blow bubbles (and milk, porrigde, pacifiers, and all other things we can possible put into our little mouth - and blow out again..)! *phreeeeewwwwwt*


And we're counting down for ohsomanythings these days..

First off, Peder's mormor is coming to town on Wednesday - and we can hardly wait to spend a couple of days with her (and Emma). ^-^

Secondly, we're moving into a new apartment some time in the next few months. And it's all ours. Our very own apartment! (The papers were signed last Thursday, and now we're just waiting for our landlord to find someone to rent our current apartment - and then we'll pack everything up in boxes and move them to the new place.)

And last - but definetly not least, not by any means - it's once again time for the (now) wonderful tradition of Secret Santa Christmans Swap (SSCS2010)! Organized - once again - by the wonderful Donna - and we're just bubbling over with anticipation, secrets and planning for what's going to be my fourth - and Peder's first - year as a special someone's Secret Santa.

(Learning to count - a little early, but there's ohsomuch to count, be happy for - and look forward too, and it doesn't really matter if one cannot count very good _yet_ - we'll get there in time.)

But for now, I'm going to stop getting annoyd over the seemingly endless commercials running during this somewhat entertaining Ben Stiller-movie (although I really don't like any of his movies.. but seem to find this one rather funny) - and go to bed. Tomorrow is Monday, another day closer to Christmas - and we're off swimming in the afternoon. ^-^

(And for more crafty news, I'm working on Peder's Christmas stocking. There's no rush, I doubt he'll find it interesting for another year or two, but it helps to build the ohsoenjoyable Christmas'sey feeling I feel is flowing in from every nook and corner of the world (even if the shops haven't put their decorations up _yet_ - but give them a month or two and they will surely have them up).

It's beginning to look alot like Christmas..

Here there be monsters..

I love the saying that's written on old maps - here there be monsters. I guess that - instead of admitting that they didn't know what was in unexplored areas in the old days - they'd write that, believing that anything unknown or places that were new actually were inhabited by monsters.. like dragons, krakens, a giant octopussy, etc. I'd love to one day have one of these old maps - or a copy of one - on our wall.

Speaking of monsters, there's one in our house too. ;) Just look at these feet!



And toes with claws!


But don't worry, it's just Peder - playing in his dragon/dinosaur playsuit. :)


He's becoming such a big boy now, 4 months old, and just last week he learned how to roll from his back to his stomack (but not the other way - yet - so we have to move him back after a little while). :) He actually started doing this on his dad's birthday (4 months and 2 days old).


We spent a lovely week in Trysil with Peder's grandmother last week. Didn't get much done - like sewing - but we managed to squease in alot of social time (with many relatives, friends, etc) and as you can see, Peder really enjoyed spending time with his grandmother. :)

Most times when we take Peder out for a walk (him in his stroller) we actually end up like this - him in a harness on my tummy. He's way to curious, and doesn't like to be in a position where he cannot keep an eye on the world (or so it seems) - like lying down in his stroller.. that's really no fun at all!

On the more creative side, I've continued to work on Sublime Season (from Cinderberry Stitches). I've got 7 blocks done now, and am working on the last two. I've also managed to get some more work done on my Tailfeather BOM (also from Cinderberry Stitches). I can actually see a light in the tunnel for having this one completed one day - but I'm not going to say when that will be, with a little one in the house even blogging seems to be a less prioritised activity.. among so many others. But, and I know I've said this before, I'm going to try to blog a little more often. Perhaps kicking myself into atleast once a week? We'll see. ;)

Believe it..

or not, but I am actually able to get a few stitches done every now and then. ^-^

Since my last post, this handsome little guy has entered (and taken over) our lives. Please say "hi" to Peder Arian - 5 weeks old and celebrating his first Constitution Day (17th of May). :)


And yes, we did get some comments on his outfit. ;)


I have been working on the ever so gorgeous Sublime Season from Cinderberry Stitches for a while now - prepared all the 9 blocks before Peder arrived, and have been able to get a few stitches done every now and then (sometimes when he naps during the day - but mostly after he's gone to bed at night). So far I have 5 blocks completed. This one - for some reason - insists on being shown upsidedown.. Oh well. It's still pretty. ^-^

First post of 2010?

Wow.. I guess time really has flown by lately (lately? try the last two months, that's more like it)..

I had a very good January, regarding finishing things anyway, but never got around to blog them.. So in the picture below you'll see three stitcheries from Tilda, one from Cinderberry Stitches, two (they are more or less identical) stitcheries with the wonderful message reading "Relax, Christmas will come" (I figured that these would be good for a pre-Christmas gift to some people I know later this year), and two stitceries copied from the 30's (I found the pattern in a quiltshop near Bemidji (Minnesota) a few years ago, and have planned to make something of them for ages, but never got around to it - until late last year. So that concludes the January finished objects.



Trained eyes will notices some knitting in front, and yes, I have to admit that lately knitting has been the preferred activity. It's soo much less fuss to get around - you need knitting needles and yarn (and sometimes a pattern), which suits my mood at the moment. ;) In the back is a tiny baby hat I knitted (to test the yarn and the pattern). Not quite sure how I feel about it, but I guess I get to test the sizing soon. The medium blue in the middle is a scarf knitted in lovely soft alpacca yarn. And in front there's another scarf (same basic pattern, only the stitces are different) in multicoloured japanese yarn (silk and wool - a true luxury). For some reason I started to think about next Christmas, and seeing that I _might_ not have quite as much time (or energy) to prepare handmade gifts this year, I decided to have a UFO-marathon, finish things that's been around for ages, and just decide to put them in a gift pile. I still have a pile of "needing borders" or "needing backing" to do, and I am going to try to get these done too, while I still have time/energy. (I guess I should be really lucky for living in Norway - I have the time now, no stress, because I started my leave on Tuesday this week. Monday was my last day working - until November, if things go as planned. And I have absolutely no bad feelings for not exactly doing a ton of things in a day. If I get one thing done, maybe two, I'm satisfied.)



More finished objects - thanks to my mother for doing the quilting - are two quilts for the little one. I had a pack of 30's jelly stripes from Keepsake's (bought it about two years ago) and decided to make a simple throw-quilt with flannel backing, to use whenever we had a very early morning or "up in the middle of the night" event. The depressing part is that I have about half of the strips left.. which is quite annoying.. And then there's the bunny quilt. I started this some time in August/September last year, intending it to be the little one's crib quilt. It's a little big, but then again, the size means that it'll be usable for a significant time. I just LOVE the bunnies!



One of today's main events have been cleaning toys. I've used a cloth dipped in warm water and wiped off all the toys in the toybox. Some are bought by me and BF, some were given to the little one for Christmas, some inherited from cousin Emma - and some are actually from when my sister and I were small (which makes it really cool - I mean, who doesn't like finding things from their own childhood and use for their own children? All of these are currently on display on the top of our dryer.


Another thing that I've been doing for the past couple of weeks, is landry. Several loads of laundry, in (well, to be honest) incredible small sizes. Just look at the feet on those pants!



Or the size of these socks? (I actually used those socks when my parents brought me home from the hospital - and I have a feeling they're going to be used again soon.)


Spring is (finally) coming to Oslo these days - suddenly it's not that cold anymore, with temperatures reaching into the plus degrees celsius. Still quite alot of snow - and ice.. - but we're getting there. Finally! Now, if only the snow on the roof all over the city would melt away, so that we didn't have to strain our necks every time we go outside - it's pretty dangerous outside when you can risk getting a significant amount of snow and ice in your head just heading out to the store.. :S

Christmas is almost over - and 2010 is almost here.

We spent the Christmas weekend in Trysil with my family this year. For the first time (ever, I think) both sets of grandparents were with us for dinner and unwrapping of gifts (we do that on December 24th here in Norway). All in all we spent about three hours opening gifts, and we were 9 people there - including Emma. Next year, for New Years, I suppose there will be another little one with us.

Both my mom and I decided to save the SSCS-parcels for when we all opened our other gifts, hop over to her blog and see what she received from her Secret Santa. :)

My Secret Santa this year was Anne from the UK. Look at the gorgeous wallhanging she made for me - thank you soooo much! The quilting is absolutely gorgeous.



Because we weren't going to be home for Christmas Eve - nor for New Years Eve - we decided to not put up all the decorations this year. I like our Christmas decorations, but - unlike last year, when we decided to stay at home for most of the time, and even had a Christmas tree - this year we brought out the advents lights, the advent star and some of these newly made elves that were made and ended up a little bit here and there around our apartment.


I bought them at Panduro, in a kit, and they were fun and easy to put together.

There has been a little time - and inspiration - for stitching so far this Christmas. I brought with me 4 pieces of the Tail Feathers-pattern to Trysil, and managed to finish them all (these are miniature blocks, to go together with other blocks to form block 3 and 4 of the Tail Feathers-quilt by Cinderberry Stitches). I've prepped stitching blocks from block 6 and 7 to work on (I'm saving block 5 a little, not quite sure about those tiny applicated circles... hmm...) and also the four stitching blocks from one of her (Cinderberry Stitches, again, if you didn't guess it) lates patterns, Raspberry Cream. The raspberry red is a little bit too pink for my liking, but I'm giving it a go - it might turn out lovely, as most of the patterns I've tried from Cinderberry Stitches.


Wishing you all a wonderful New Year! May it bring happiness and joy, inspiration and creativity.

I know what we'll be doing the next couple of months.. and we've already started. Thanks to my sister and a friend of hers, we've got drawers full of tiny clothes, we've started to buy the basics, like a sheep's wool/skin, and other useful items. March is not _that_ far away anymore, less than 100 days away.. *yikes*

Counting down for Christmas

Well, it's about 17 days left - and I _think_ we're starting to see things come together. There's a pile of presents wrapped and ready in the bedroom, some in the mail (what on earth did we do before the whole online Christmas shopping was available??), and some need to be fixed in one or two of the local stores, but I do still believe that things are under control.

Last week I received my SSCS parcel - and it came from the UK, from the lovely Anne. Just look at that cute ornament that she made - and the shiny parcel is very tempting, but it's being safely stored until Christmas eve. We'll be celebrating Christmas with my family this year, so I think that my mom and I might open our SSCS parcels at the same time. :)



Nothing much going on besides Christmas planning these days.. it's raining on and off in Oslo, so the world is grey and black and kinda depressing. We had one morning last week which was white and snowy, but it started to rain around lunchtime, so that didn't last very long.. oh well, there will be snow in Trysil, and most likely also in Hvittingfoss.

I'm thinking about arranging a give-away here on the blog in a couple of days, to celebrate 100 posts (been a while since that happened, though), that Epla is up and running (the Norwegian answer to Etsy, and yes, we do have a tiny shop there), that Christmas is near, and just because - well - in the darkest parts of the year, one needs a little light sometimes. So stay tuned or come back soon, and we'll see what we can arrange. ;)

Have a wonderful pre-Christmas day!

Ready for the postoffice

Well, the time has come. The time to pack up the SSCS-parcel and get it on it's way.


This year's work was a little different than the previous ones, considering that my focus (unfortunetly?) was not completely focused (haha) on the SSCS and my "victim". But! I think that the finished parcel and it's contents worked out pretty good. I just hope that the receiver will enjoy it too.


So, there you have it, ready and packed - will be delivered to the postoffice tomorrow afternoon (just need to get through another day at work first).

Perhaps I can find time (focus??) to get some work done on some Christmas presents too, now - or perhaps that too will be a little difficult?

Some changes

Well, I am painfully aware of the fact that this blog hasn't been regularly updated since.. well, almost ever - and the fact is that there hasn't been much sewing going on lately either.

With exception of some SSCS secret stuff which cannot and should not be shown on this blog - yet - there has been very little sewing and quilting going on.

Instead, knitting needles have been in use, producing some very small things.. very, very small things..

Needless to say, there's something else that seems to take over the time, thoughts and lives of ourselves and our families.

So, without further chit-chatting around the - until now - pretty much private matter, please welcome our little alien, our thingy, tiny - and what ever other nickname he/she is going to have over the next months:


The big introduction will happen sometime between March and April.

And so, to those who feel that the activity level of this blog has been non-excisting, or that we have been very little out in public lately, I hope that you will forgive us. I doubt that this trend will change any time soon - but one's always allowed to hope, right?

Last weekend

An extra vacation in London.

This is taken from the top of the London Eye. Kinda fun to see some of the big sightings, like the bridge they ruined in "Harry Potter and the half-blood prince" (and, I believe, in one of the episodes of "Dr. Who"), being on the London Eye (which they almost broke in one of the "Fantastic Four"-movies), and seeing the Parlament, which they blew up last night (just kidding, but they did blow it up in "V for Vendetta", which was shown on TV last night).

Bunnies and knitting

Both in brown.

I suppose that I'm getting a little tired of making stuff for other people all (ahem, most) the time. It seems that most of the things I've made lately have either been intended for others - or made as gifts. About time to be a little selfish and make something just for me, don't you think? :)

I've not completely finished the stuff going to my little victim (SSCS2009) yet, but it's not much more work until it's finished. I just need to find the inspiration to sit down by the sewing machine. It seems to be pretty hard these days. (It's easier to work on bunnies or knitting in front of the TV than to move the TV to the kitchen, where the sewing machine sits).

Fall's here!

And homemade bread make's it almost perfect. :)

A quiet moment..

Between the battles. :)

A new project in red.

Can you guess what it'll be?

Edit : It's in wool - again. It seems cotton yarn and me don't get along very well.. Something about the flexibility of the yarn, I think. But! Wool is very nice to knit with. Especially merino. ;)

Preparing for Winter!

Well, a bit early, yes, but one can never be too prepared. ;)

Not quite the summer feeling.

It's raining again, but still pretty warm outside.

Blafre Design (in Norwegian)

Blafre Design har en trekning på gang i disse dager (trekningen vil foretas mandag kl. 21:00) og man kan vinne gavekort fra nettbutikken deres. Blafre designer noen utrolig kule bokser og kort - og jeg vet at i allefall jeg ikke hade hatt stort imot å få en ny matboks. ;)

Hvis du har lyst til å være med, ta en tur innom Blafre Design og ta en kikk.

Lykke til!

Getting there - & sinking in

Well, I have been thinking about writing this post for - well, more or less - forever, but it's been put off over and over again. I guess, when busy times at work take most of one's enery, writing a blog post is an extra mile of work.

What's been going on lately? Emma's baptism took place a couple of weeks ago. As you can see, Emma was quite pleased with the purple monster - Ox - that she got from her aunt and uncle. ^-^ (Not one of our creations, I'm afraid, but UglyDolls are quite good at making monsters too.)



I joined a block of the month (BOM) from Buttonberry about a month ago, and a couple of weeks ago I got the first block in the mail. And, just as I receive an email telling me that block two is in the mail, I finished the first block. It's the gorgeous "Tailfeathers" by Cinderberry Stitches!

I'm using the same floss and fabric range as the pattern calls for - Patisserie, by Moda - and I just have to say that this might be the cutest, most adorable BOM I've seen in a while. ^-^It was cute as a pattern, cute drawn up on the fabric, adorable stitched - and just gorgeous sewn together. Can't wait for the next block - but, with my luck, it won't arrive until we're on the plane. We're off to Iceland in about two days time - and should really be spending the time packing, but, oh well, one can pack the night before, right?

We're spending 10 days in and around Reykjavik, so if anyone have any ideas or tips about what we should see while we're there, let us know. ;)

The feeling of vacation is slowly sinking in - although so far it's more or less feeling alot like a normal weekend - only, no alarms are set for tomorrow morning. ;D

Time continues to fly

Strange, isn't it, how time always seem to fly so fast - eventhough you have tons of things you would like to do - and suddenly it's Sunday, and it's been more or less a month since the last "real" post. Oh well.. I blame it on periods of sunshine, knitting and movies (Dr. Who The New Series and Criminal Minds are definetly to blame here). :)

Well, I think the last post contained a picture from the NQT in Göteborg - a great trip, but somewhat chaotic, considering all the people. The dinner had 664 registered guests (I wonder what happened to the dessert? o_O ), the city was beautiful, and a tiny bit of shopping was done. I only bought two things at the NQT shop area (well, three, but the last one was a gift for the summer lottery in Lørenskog, so it doesn't really count) - a jellyroll from Moda (Patisserie, to be used in the new Cinderberry Stitches BOM, which should arrive some time now in June) and a kit (sewing kit in blue/gray) from QuiltMyDesign - which I think ended up being everybody's favorite shop.

I went to my very first course in Göteborg (been sewing since I could hold a needle - and quilting since I was about 10 or 12) and I absolutely loved it! But I do believe that if I ever go to another course, I might be very disappointed.. According to the more course-experienced ladies attending, noone had ever been to a better prepared course. The lovely lady who held it, Mirjam Hakala from Finland, had prepared 10 projects (actually 12, since one of them had three different solutions to chose from) under the theme "The Quilter's Sewing Accessories" (course no. 22), and she had made models showing all of them, written great and easily understood (incredible detailed) descriptions of how to create them - and on top of it all, she had prepared individually packed kits for all models (precut fabric, paper templates, drawn templates, buttons, beads, string, everything you could possible need to complete each model)!

I brought my (then) 4 completed models to show a couple of the ladies in Lørenskog the following Wednesday, and they all agreed that I should finish all the models by the August meeting (the first one after the summer) and have a little presentation of the course. And I'm working on it. ;) As you see in the picture below, I have now completed 6 of the models, and have four kits left - although I am thinking about making the two other versions of the star (on the left) but then again, I have made these ones before, so I can just bring two of them to illustrate the choices.



In other news, I'm still knitting! I've figured out that I'm unable to read while driving (bus or car), I haven't tried sewing yet, but knitting works like a charm! So far - since April - I've knitted a shawl (picture will come soon, I just need to get a good one) and fall pants for Emma, and currently I'm working on another blanket in light wool (just to have something ready for when we go driving.

Speaking of Emma, it's her baptism next Sunday, so we'll be going up to Trysil - and so will more or less the rest of the family too. My national costume is ready (bunad, as we call it) and I have bought the shoes to wear with it, so I'll be sure to get some pictures of that too.

And last, but not least, I'd like to say "Hi!" to the wonderful girls from Lillehammer, who we shared table with during the dinner in Göteborg. It was lovely to meet you - and I hope we meet again soon. :)

I'm off to get some lunch now - and possible a walk outside in the sun. A Frozen Cocoa seems very tempting (it's actually very very nice).

Have a nice Sunday!

NQT in Gøteborg

A bit chaotic - and some waiting.

Tempus Fugit - Busy Times

Well, it's been a while, and although I've thought about blogging every now and then, time just hasn't been on my good side. Much thanks to this little girl.

Meet Emma, our niece and the newest member of the family.




There hasn't been much sewing going on lately, more knitting, actually. In the picture above, taken on her first real trip outside in her stroller, Emma's wearing a hat I knitted up the night before (the other one she got was a little tight, and nobody likes a tight hat, now do we?).

But I think - maybe - I'll manage to get a more creative post together soon. Sometime. Maybe. ;)

We're off to Göteborg next week - for the Nordic Quilt Meeting. I should definetly manage to get some pictures from there. :) And maybe, just maybe, Cinderberry Stitches will finish her new BOM soon too - my fingers are itching!